Sir, - Mary Leland's recent lament at the outrageous treatment meted out to St Multose Church in Kinsale by the Cork planning authorities (An Irishwoman's Diary, November xxx) may well apply to another medieval church if proposals before the planners here are accepted.
It is proposed to build a multi-storey car park right in the centre of Galway opposite St Nicholas's Collegiate Church. Being four times the volume of the church and considerably higher in parts than the main body of the church, it will dominate it.
Moreover it will be extremely damaging to the townscape of Galway. In particular it will no longer be possible to see the roof, tower and gables of St Nicholas from the Salmon Weir Bridge. This familiar and much-photographed view will be replaced by a huge slab with cars parked on top with perhaps the top of the steeple peeping over. What price progress? - Yours, etc.,
Very Rev Dr R. B. MacCarthy,
The Rectory,
Taylors Hill,
Galway.